The Lair of Bones

by David Farland

  “I don't know the full story,” Borenson said. “Perhaps no one does. But you know how Inkarrans feel about us ‘Dayborn’ breeding with their people?”

  “They don't approve?”

  “That's putting it mildly,” Borenson said. “They won't talk about it to your face, but many Inkarrans are sickened by the mere thought of it—and for good reason. Any child from such a union takes on the skin, the hair, and the eye color of the Dayborn parent.”

  “Which means?” Myrrima began.

  “A full-blooded Inkarran, one with ice white eyes, can see in total darkness, even when traveling through the Underworld. But many half-breeds can see no better at night than we do, and the dark eyes follow down from generation to generation. The Inkarrans call such part-breeds kutasarri, spoiled fruit of the penis. They're shunned in their own land by some, pitied by others, forever separate from the Night Children.”

  Myrrima remembered the half-breed assassin that had tried to kill Gaborn.

  “But,” she argued, “even some in the royal families are kutasarri. Even the Storm King's own nephew—”

  “Shall never sit on a throne,” Borenson finished.

  “Here's a mystery,” Myrrima said. “Why would a kutasarri from Inkarra agree to act as an assassin? Why would he try to kill Gaborn? Certainly it wouldn't be for love of country.”

  “Perhaps he merely wants to prove his worth to his own people,” Borenson said. “But there may be more to it. The Inkarrans do not just hate us for the color of our eyes. They call us barbarians. They hate our customs, our way of life, our civilization. They think themselves superior.”

  “That can't be the whole argument,” Myrrima said. “I've seen Inkarrans in Heredon. They didn't seem to hold us in contempt at all. There has to be something more.”

  “All right,” Borenson said, “A history lesson, then. Some sixty years ago, Gaborn's grandfather, Timor Rajim Orden, discovered that many Inkarrans who were entering our lands were criminals fleeing justice, so he closed the borders. He turned back many of their traders, and told the minor nobles to put on trial any man that they believed posed a threat. Three minor Inkarran nobles in Duke Bellinghurst's realm thus went to trial, and proudly admitted that they were more than criminals—they were assassins bent on killing the king's Dedicates. They were from a southern tribe of Inkarra, one that despises us more than most, and had sworn to destroy us barbarians in Mystarria. Bellinghurst executed the men summarily, without first seeking King Orden's approval. King Orden was a moderate man, and some say that he would have merely outlawed the offenders. But I think that unlikely, and in any case, it was too late. So he sent their bodies home as a warning to all Inkarrans.

  “When the dead men reached their own land, their families cried out for vengeance to their high king. So King Zandaros fired off a choleric missive protesting the executions and cursing all northerners. Gaborn's grandfather sent a skyrider over the mountains, telling Zandaros that if he refused to patrol his own borders, then he had no business protesting our attempts to protect ourselves. A day later, a skyrider from Inkarra dropped a bag on the uppermost ramparts at the Courts of Tide, at the very feet of King Orden. In it was the head of the child that had borne the message to the Storm King, and with the head came an edict warning that the citizens of Mystarria—and all of the other kingdoms in Rofehavan—would no longer be tolerated in Inkarra. Soon after, the Inkarrans began building their runewall across the northern borders, a shield that none dare now pass.”

  “But that was a long time ago,” Myrrima argued. “Perhaps the new high king will be more tolerant?”

  “Zandaros is still the High King of Indhopal. It's true that he's old, but he's more than a king, it is said. He is a powerful sorcerer who can summon storms, and he uses his powers to extend his life.”

  “But,” Myrrima protested, “in sixty years, surely his anger has cooled. His argument was with Gaborn's grandfather, not with us.”

  “Aye,” Borenson said. “That's my hope. It is the only thing that might save us. We come as the envoys not of the old king but of a new, and we bear entreaties of peace. Even that black-hearted old badger should respect that.”

  There was a pregnant silence. Borenson loved his wife, and was offering her one last opportunity to abandon their quest. But Myrrima said with finality, “I won't be left behind.”

  “Very well,” Borenson said.

  Borenson gave over three forcibles of stamina to the marquis's facilitator, an elderly man who studied the forcibles with glee, as if he had not seen so many together in a long, long time. The facilitator went to a logbook and came back shaking his head. “Only two folks have offered to give stamina in the past year. Would you like to wait until our criers find a third?”

  “That could take weeks.” Borenson sighed. “Give me what you can now, and send out the criers. Perhaps you can vector the third endowment to me?”

  “Done,” the facilitator said, disappearing from the room to make the arrangements. For a moment they stood in the silence, and Myrrima gazed about at the work chamber filled with implements of the facilitators’ craft. There were scales for weighing blood metal, tongs and hammers and files, a small forge, thick iron molds for making forcibles. A chart on the wall showed the various runes that allowed the transfer of each type of endowment, like sight and wit, along with possible minor variations in the shape of the runes. Cryptic notes written in the secret language of facilitators were scrawled upon the charts.

  Myrrima gazed curiously at Borenson. She noticed that he was pacing, and his face seemed a bit pale. “How do you feel?”

  “Fine,” he replied. “Why?”

  “The facilitator back in Carris said that he'd vector endowments to you: metabolism, brawn, wit. But you're not moving any faster now than you did two days ago. Do you think he forgot?”

  “No,” Borenson said. “The facilitators keep copious notes. I'm sure he's just too busy. The city was—” He searched for the right word for the destruction of Carris. The walls of the city had buckled under the onslaught of the reavers, and many of its finest towers had fallen. The lands for thirty miles around lay black and blasted, every plant dead. The corpses of reavers, black monoliths with mouths gaping wide, littered the fields along with dead men. The reavers’ curses hung over the city—a reek that demanded that the men inside dry up, be blind, and rot and putrefy. Recalling the nightmare of Carris, Myrrima could think of no word to describe it. Destroyed was too weak. Demolished? Devastated? Borenson offered “Expunged.”

  “Still,” Myrrima said, “plenty of people survived. He should be able to get Dedicates.”

  “But those people want nothing more than to get away from Carris,” Borenson said. “The facilitators had their hands full just trying to move the Dedicates, boat them downstream. I'm sure that he'll get the endowments vectored as soon as he can.”

  Though he reassured Myrrima, Borenson didn't seem so confident him-self. He began to pace about the room. In all likelihood, his Dedicates were floating downriver now, perhaps on their way to the Courts of Tide. If the facilitator was with them, he'd be looking for a place to settle them, and Myrrima knew by report that most of the towns along the river would be too full of injured and homeless refugees to take on a large number of Dedicates. Under such conditions, it might be days or weeks before the facilitator returned to his normal duties.

  Borenson's lack of endowments put an uneven burden on Myrrima. As a soldier she didn't have Borenson's years of training, but she had more endowments and was definitely stronger, faster, smarter. In every way, she was more prepared for a journey to Inkarra than he.

  Perhaps that was why Borenson paced. He went to a window, looked out, sighed, and then sat down with his back against the wall. He was pale, trembling all over. Sweat stood out on his forehead.

  “What's wrong?” Myrrima asked.

  “I don't know if I can do this anymore,” he said. “I've seen too many Dedicates die.”

  Myrrima knew what h
e was thinking. He had been forced to butcher Raj Ahten's Dedicates at Castle Sylvarresta—thousands of men, women, and children in a single night. And he was thinking of his own Dedicates that Raj Ahten had murdered at the Blue Tower.

  “You know,” he said softly, “the marquis was right about me. As a young man, I always wanted to be a Runelord. I wanted to prove myself, and I thought that taking endowments would make me powerful. But it doesn't just give you power. It gives you new responsibilities, and leaves you open to… whole new worlds of suffering.”

  Within the hour the facilitator brought the Dedicates, two robust young girls, aged eleven and twelve. They stood just behind a curtain in the receiving room, a comfortable room, gaily painted, with warm couches to put the potential Dedicates at ease. Myrrima could hear the girls talking to the facilitator, begging for assurances that their widowed mother and younger brothers would receive food from the king's stores.

  “Fine young sacrifices, both of them,” Borenson whispered angrily as he peered through the curtain.

  He trembled as the facilitator drew the stamina from the girls, along with their screams of pain. And when the forcibles kissed his own flesh, even the rush of ecstasy that came with taking an endowment did not stop him from shaking. As the facilitator's aids carried the girls away afterward, both of them pale and weak with shock, Borenson vomited on the facilitator's floor.

  8

  HOLLOW WOLVES

  The hollow wolf may have taken its name from its unusual profile. It is long of leg, with a stomach that hugs the beast's backbone and looks perpetually empty. But I favor the theory that the creature takes its name from its icy, soulless eyes.

  In the days of mad King Harrill, the creature was hunted nearly to extinction. However, on an outing the king heard a chorus of their haunting voices, deeper and more resonant than those of their smaller cousins.

  “Ah, what beauteous music these wolves do make. Let their voices fill these mountains forever!” said he, banning the hunting of the creatures for nearly forty years, until the mountains became overrun.

  After his death, the hunt resumed. Indeed, entire armies were deployed in what became known as the “War of the Wolves!'

  —from Mammals of Rofehavan, by The Wizard Binnesman

  South of Batenne, the road up into the Alcair Mountains became a deso-late track. In places, the forests covered it completely, and often Myrrima and Borenson found themselves riding through trees, squinting vainly for sight of the road. But as they began to climb above the forests toward the jagged icy peaks, the ruts and stone walls along the road could be easily discerned.

  The voices of hollow wolves could be heard in the distant mountains, eerily howling, like the moan of wind among rocks.

  They had just stopped to put on heavy cloaks, and were in the last of the thinning trees where mounds of snow still huddled in the shadows of boulders, when Myrrima became aware of another rider.

  “Our friend is near,” Myrrima said. “I can smell him up the road.”

  “The assassin?” Borenson asked.

  She got off her horse and warily strung her bow. She drew an arrow from her quiver, and spat on the sharp steel bodkin, anointing it with water from her own body. “Strike true,” she whispered. She looked to Borenson.

  Borenson drew his warhammer. He seemed self-conscious. He was not a Water wizard, but Myrrima had washed him and offered the Water's blessings upon him. He spat on the spike, and whispered, “May Water guide you.”

  She peered up the road. The land rose steadily. Dwarf pines, nearly black against the fields of blinding snow up above, grew in ragged patches on the slopes of the mountain. There wasn't much cover, not many places for a man to hide. But Myrrima felt sure that the assassin was far enough ahead that he could not have spotted them.

  “How far?” Borenson asked.

  “A mile or two,” Myrrima said.

  “You take the right side of the road, I'll take the left,” Borenson said. They tied their horses to a tree, then split up. Each of them crept through the woods on opposite sides of the road.

  The snow was rife with wolf tracks. Myrrima strained her senses, letting her gaze pierce the shadows, listening for any sound-—a cough, the snap of a twig. She sniffed the air. The wind was blowing in odd directions among the trees. She'd lose his scent one moment, smell it twice as strong the next.

  There was little cover here, and after half a mile of sneaking, the trees gave out almost completely.

  Myrimma leapt over the ground and raced ahead, her feet softly shushing in the snow. With five endowments of metabolism added to her brawn and stamina, she could run effortlessly for hours. More important, she could run faster than most horses. She hoped that this speed would give her the advantage in any fight.

  She raced along at fifty or sixty miles an hour, head low, scenting for the smell of the assassin. She had never run like this since taking her endowments. It was queer.

  Time did not seem to pass any differently. She ran at a good pace, but not overly quick. Yet when she rounded a bend, she could feel an odd force tugging her, so that she quickly learned to lean into her turns. And when she topped a rise, her stomach would do a little twist as she went airborne.

  She felt sleek and powerful, like a wolf as it races after a stag.

  The air grew thin and chill. Frost stood up in the dirt where the day's sun had not yet penetrated the shadows. Higher up the mountain, the sun glinted on snow. She was nearly past the treeline when the odor of the assassin's horse came suddenly strong.

  She drew to a stop, and watched the road ahead. She could smell the brittle scent of a fire, its ashes gone cold. The assassin had made camp uphill, to her right among a knot of trees. She hoped that he might be asleep.

  Myrrima peered at the spot for a long moment, but saw no movement, and could not make out any form that seemed vaguely human.

  She crept off the road two hundred yards, and circled up through a gully into the trees. She saw no sign of anyone, yet the smell of horseflesh grew stronger. She let her nose guide her into the thick copse of pine, up a ridge, past a fallen log.

  She did not spot the assassin's camp until she was less than forty feet from it. He hid in the midst of thick trees, their branches forming a natural roof. At some time in ages past a depression had been dug there, and a small rock wall built up to chest height in a semicircle, forming a crude defense. She saw a horse's ears poking above the rocks, and Myrrima froze for a moment.

  She could hear the assassin, drawing deep, wheezing breaths. She scented the air. She could smell blood and rot. The man was injured.

  Myrrima looked behind her. Borenson had seen her run, and he was leaping up the hill toward her, trying to catch her. He slipped in a deep snowdrift, and for a moment snow churned in the air all around him as he fought back to his feet. She raised a warning hand, dropped to cover behind a tree, and waited for him.

  When he drew near, he was huffing for breath. He tried to still it. He peered into the dense foliage, saw the little camp there, and nodded. He motioned for her to circle the camp, come at it from behind.

  Myrrima crept along the edge of the wood, walking in slushy snow. A twig crunched beneath her foot, under the snow. She could barely see the top of the horse's head there in the camp. The horse's ear went erect.

  Wolf tracks littered the ground here at the edge of the camp. Myrrima looked up and saw a white form against some dark trees uphill. A huge wolf was there, as motionless as the snow. Suddenly it spun in its tracks and bounded away over the ice field, emitting a soft woof.

  At that instant, she heard another twig snap behind her. She turned and saw Borenson, warhammer held high behind his head, charging toward the hidden camp.

  A rush of wind came screaming through the trees toward them. It didn't come from uphill. Instead, it was like a tornado leaning on its side, aiming toward Myrrima and her husband. The forest shook like thunder, while bits of pine needles, cones, and icy shards of snow suddenly whirled in a v
ortex, obscuring Myrrima's view.

  Her heart nearly froze in her chest. For a moment she thought that the Darkling Glory must be near, for she had experienced nothing like this outside the monster's presence.

  “Sorcery!” she cried, stunned motionless.

  A blinding blast of wind and ice came whipping over her, knocking the arrow from her hands.

  Pinecones and twigs pelted her; shards of ice slammed into her eyes and teeth. Myrrima squinted and raised her hand protectively, trying to see through the tempest.

  With a roar, Borenson charged. The storm turned on him. He leapt into the pit.

  His warhammer fell and with a sickening thud slammed into flesh. A wailing cry arose. “Oooooooh!”

  Wind rushed about the trees then, circling like a storm.

  The man's cry kept ripping from his throat. Pine needles and ice lashed through the air in a maelstrom, then went rushing south up the slopes toward Inkarra.

  Myrrima heard the scream “Noooooo!” in the wind, as it drew farther and farther away, echoing among the canyons.

  She ran up to Borenson, knowing what she would find.

  He stood over a corpse, struggling to free the spike of his hammer from a wizard's head. The dead man wore the blue tunic of Mystarria's couriers, with the image of the green man on his chest. But his long silver hair pro-claimed him to be of Inkarran birth. His eyes were flung open, and his mouth drawn in a little circle of surprise or pain.

  His horse whinnied pitifully at the sight of strangers, and tried to rise. But its legs had been shackled.

  “Pilwyn coly Zandaros,” Myrrima mouthed the man's name.

  “This is the wizard that tried to kill Gaborn?” Borenson confirmed.

  She nodded. Pilwyn had been both an assassin and a wizard of the Air. Myrrima shook her head in confusion. “What do you think he was up to? Waiting in ambush?”